


as my mind splits apart at the end of the world

by YdrittE



Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Gratuitous References to Certain Past Works of Mine, Other, Set Sometime Post-Compilation Idk, Time Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:42:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28282635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YdrittE/pseuds/YdrittE
Summary: “Where’s Sephiroth?” he asks.Jenova doesn’t move. She doesn’t speak.Deep inside her mind, a terrible unease begins to take shape, an unfamiliar beast that whispers three words, and three words are enough. Where is Sephiroth?
Relationships: Jenova/Sephiroth (Compilation of FFVII)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	as my mind splits apart at the end of the world

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, remember the Rarepair Week 2018, when I wrote Jenova and Sephiroth snowed in together? Yeah me neither, but this is basically story-adjacent to that. I wrote it literally four days ago and then went "hey, I'll post on Christmas so it looks like it's in purpose!"
> 
> Title from “Dansið eða deyið” by Hatari. Yes, I am now apparently one of those people who put their titles in all lower case, don’t ask why. It just be like that.

The window is covered in sprawling, frozen kaleidoscopes on both sides of the glass. It has been for a while.

_How long?_

Jenova isn’t sure. Time has never mattered much, does not matter much, will never matter much. She has existed too long for it to matter. The gravity of time affects her very little, if at all. It makes her infinitely light. It also, unfortunately, makes her prone to float away and forget about time completely if not reminded that it exists.

She runs a finger across the pattern on the window, her own body temperature barely higher than the ice, than the air in the cabin. Her body does not shiver. She can barely see the world outside the window through the ice patterns. Just white shapes, vague and unmoving. There were footprints in the snow at some point, she thinks. At many points. There are no footprints there now.

_Whose footprints?_

Something stirs within her, and she stirs along with it, her frozen limbs curling and fidgeting. Jenova turns her head, her one eye scanning the space behind her. The cabin is tiny, and it is empty save for her. She is alone.

That feels wrong.

Jenova is not meant to be alone. She is meant to be splintered into a million pieces that are pulled towards the core of her like gravity, that return to her however far they may have strayed.

She reaches out in her mind, slow and careful and… tired. Jenova is tired. She is not _meant_ to be tired. She reaches out and tastes the world outside, searching for a remnant of herself, a bundle of warmth and living cells to ease her mind and drive away the cold.

It takes her a while to find it, down by the old dig site, too far for her to fully make out their body and mind but close enough for her to _nudge_. They freeze in place and drop a tool they were holding, and then very, very slowly stand up straight and turn towards her. She can feel their eyes. Or maybe imagines she does. It does not matter.

Jenova nudges again.

 _Come home_.

The piece of her that she has found hesitates. Distantly, she feels their confusion, and it bleeds over into her. They are not meant to be confused. Jenova should be familiar.

Nonetheless, they start moving, drag their feet to one of the tents and pick up a bag from inside it. They make some noise to other humans that are digging there, wave a hand and turn towards the forest.

They take a step, and Jenova stops looking. She has seen enough. They are coming.

-

The ice flowers on the window have multiplied just a little bit more when the knock comes. Jenova has been watching them grow for a long time now. She is not sure how long exactly.

The door is frozen shut. It has been for a while. Jenova grabs the handle and pulls it open effortlessly.

Outside stands a bundle of her cells in the shape of a young man, eyes bright from her influence and seemingly oblivious to the cold despite his clothing being unpadded and entirely unsuited for this weather. He looks her up and down, confusion still radiating from him.

“Why are you summoning me?” he asks, not accusing or angry, but not exactly happy either. “I thought you had decided you didn’t need me anymore. Why am I here?”

Jenova makes a humming noise deep in her throat. She doesn’t know if she’s upset or not. Did she tell this man to go away? She doesn’t remember.

The man stands there, unmoving, and waits for an answer. In the back of her brain mutters a voice that says she wishes he would go away again. He is wrong. He is not meant to be here. Jenova is not meant to be alone, but her company is not meant to include this man. He apparently knew that from the moment she called out to him.

She has no answer for him. The man leans to the side to look inside the cabin, then back at her. His confusion deepens visibly. “Where’s Sephiroth?” he asks.

Jenova doesn’t move. She doesn’t speak.

Deep inside her mind, a terrible unease begins to take shape, an unfamiliar beast that whispers three words, and three words are enough. _Where is Sephiroth?_

Something must have betrayed her dismay, because the man takes a step forward. Not threateningly. Just… closer.

“Do you not know where Sephiroth is?” he asks. He raises a hand as if to touch her, perhaps to comfort her, but thinks better of it and lowers it again. “Did Sephiroth leave?” he asks.

Jenova takes a breath, for the first time in however long it may have been. Her lungs don’t quite cooperate at first, but she’s used to that. “I don’t know,” she tells the man. “He isn’t here. I don’t think he’s been here for quite some time.”

“Okay.” He nods. Then, after a moment’s hesitation: “Can I come in? It’s fucking freezing out here, and I don’t think I’ll be much help to you if I die from hypothermia.”

-

To the man’s disappointment, it’s equally cold inside, so he grumbles angrily and stomps back outside to go get firewood. Half an hour later, the ice flowers on the inside of the window have melted away and the air feels less like a vice and more like a hug. Jenova did not realise how cold she was. Or maybe she did, and just didn’t care.

The man watches her warily from his seat at the table, where he’s splayed out a map covered in handwritten notes and crude little drawings of what she assumed are landmarks of some sort. He clears his throat.

“Do you remember when exactly he left?”

“No.”

“Okay. Do you know _roughly_ how long ago it was? A week, a month, a year?”

Jenova raises an eyebrow. “A year seems plausible to you? How long have we been gone?”

He laughs. “Over two years. The gang had a betting pool going on where you were. Speaking of which, I owe Vincent 150 Gil now, so thanks for that.”

“You’re welcome.” She doesn’t think she knows who Vincent is, or how much money 150 Gil is supposed to be.

The man makes a non-committal grunting noise. “Anyway, how long? Roughly speaking?”

Jenova cocks her head to the side and thinks. And thinks. And thinks. And thinks some more.

“I don’t know,” she finally admits. Her head feels awfully empty. “Keeping time was never my strong suit.”

“…okay. That’s not ideal. Did he leave a note or say where he was going?”

“If he did, I would know where he was.”

“Right. Sorry.” The man looks around the room once more, and scratches his head awkwardly. “Not to sound like an asshole, but have you tried… y’know, calling for him? Like you did for me?”

Jenova shakes her head. “I don’t know where he is. Not close enough to recognise him, and I’m sure you don’t want me to just reach out and call _everybody_ , do you?” She makes a noise that she belatedly realises is a laugh. It startles her almost as much as it startles the man.

“No,” he says slowly, eyes wide. “That would be… not ideal. Don’t do that.”

“I wasn’t planning to. Sephiroth is fond of this planet.” She doesn’t know how she knows that. It seems like new information to her. To the man too, judging by his facial expression. But he doesn’t question it.

“I’ll go make some calls, see if the gang has heard any rumours lately. Maybe someone has seen him,” he says. It doesn’t sound like he believes it. But that’s fine.

-

On the list of things Yuffie expected to happen today, Cloud calling and asking “Hey, have you heard anything about Sephiroth lately?” was pretty low on the list. Right below getting gifted the Knights of the Round materia.

“Nope,” she tells him, and then adds: “I’m busy.”

She’s not, but if she says she has time, he’ll ask her to help him save the world or defeat a giant monster or something along the lines of that again, and Yuffie knows from experience that the materia she gets out of it will not be worth the trouble.

“Can you ask around?” Cloud asks on the other end of the line, completely ignoring her last two words. His voice is grainy and intercut by static. Where the hell is he calling from to have reception _that_ bad?

“I mean… I _guess_. If I _had to_. Is it urgent? Like, _really_ urgent?”

She hears Cloud let out a deep, beleaguered sigh. “Listen, I don’t know how to say this in a way that doesn’t sound weird, but I got Reunion-called to the Great Glacier and found Jenova huddled up in Holzoff’s old cabin, with Sephiroth having been gone for an indeterminate amount of time.”

“The Glacier? Oh wow.” Yuffie grins. “You owe Vincent 150 bucks.”

“Yeah, yeah, I _know_. But that’s not the point. The point is that Sephiroth is gone and Jenova doesn’t know where he is, and she seems kind of upset about it and I _really_ don’t want her to go all Supernova on us because of it. So please just ask around in the area and call me if you find anything.”

Now it’s Yuffie’s turn to let out a deep, beleaguered sigh. “Fiiiiine. I’ll ask. But I’m not going to help you track him down. Not after what happened last time!”

“That’s okay; I just need info on his location. I’ll handle the rest. Thanks, Yuffie!”

And just like that he hangs up. Yuffie resist the urge to throw the PHS and mutters a few choice swearwords that nobody is around to appreciate.

Then she promptly turns around and heads back to the village she just set out from. Hopefully, they’ll know where Sephiroth is. And also hopefully they haven’t noticed yet that the materia store’s been raided last night.

-

Cloud reckons that these might have been the most awkward phone calls he has ever made in his life – partially because the reason for the calls is even more outlandish than usual, and partially because a many-limbed, half-frozen alien is watching him from next to the fireplace as he’s making the calls. He’s not entirely sure how dangerous Jenova is in her current state, but he’s sure as hell not going to take any chances.

“They’ll ask around,” he informs her once he’s done. “And call me back if they find something. But I’m not very hopeful right now. Usually, when Sephiroth shows up, no matter where it is, I get called… basically immediately. People know I’m- well.”

Probably not a good idea to remind her of the fact that he’s the one people call because he’s the one who can defeat Sephiroth. Judging by her facial expression, Jenova knows anyway.

Cloud clears his throat. “So, uh… I’m going to go now. Look around the Glacier, see if I find tracks or something. Wait for someone to call. I’ll bring him back if I can.”

He gets no reply.

-

Jenova watches the fire burn itself down to ashes. The temperature drops sharply after that, and the ice flowers on the inside of the window return. She doesn’t move.

Her mind is reaching out ever-so-gently, searching for the rest of herself, ignoring the little speck of life traversing the Glacier. That one is not the one she’s looking for. At least she knows that much.

Further and further she stretches, lets her body fall away around her and tries to feel beyond it, like she used to do before… before what, exactly?

 _Before him. Before you decided to_ keep _him_.

Jenova hums, soft and quiet. The truth, she supposes. Nothing to it.

Much of what remained of her cells was burned away by the rain, but there are pockets of them still hidden away that the Cetra will never be able to touch – those marked so deeply even water cannot properly cleanse them. She herself, the one she is looking for… her consciousness grazes that of another one, which lies dormant and shrinks away from the unwelcome attention as if burned by it. Lucrecia would surely be more awake if her son were with her, Jenova thinks, and moves on. She pays no mind to the relief felt by the secluded lady. It is not her concern.

Not far from the waterfall is where she finds another one of her own. It doesn’t take a lot of guesswork to figure out where they are. Jenova remembers this place, and the time spent in it, short and insignificant though it was compared to the rest of her vast existence. If she was human, she might call it nostalgia. As it is, she knows it only as gravity. She thinks she knows who got caught in its pull.

The same gravity allows her to find the man wandering the Glacier. She startles him quite badly when she catches up to him, but he is smart enough not to attack her by accident.

“Nibelheim,” she tells him, and watches his eyes widen in understanding. “He tried to go home.”

-

Cloud isn’t sure why he’s following Jenova. Or why she came to find him and tell him where she was going, with the unspoken understanding that he would accompany her there. Maybe so he doesn’t waste his time half-freezing to death. Maybe because Jenova isn’t entirely sure herself what she will find in Nibelheim, and wants somebody there to… what? Bear witness? Take her grief out on? Replace Sephiroth with?

He doesn’t think she knows, either.

But he’s here, trailing after her on the narrow path through the mountains. The creatures that normally harass travellers have made themselves scarce. They know what Jenova is. He knows, too. He’s here anyway. They’re smarter than him, he thinks grimly.

The paths are overgrown and treacherous, years of disuse making themselves known. The townsfolk that used to walk here are long gone. No wonder nobody spotted Sephiroth when (if) he came here.

The reactor looms in the distance as they approach, and has done so for a while now. Cloud’s stomach coils into an anxious little knot every time he looks at it. It probably would have been better to tear it down, but why bother when nobody’s around to be upset by it? Except for him, right now.

Maybe afterwards. Depending on what happens there.

Jenova hasn’t said a word since she found him, hasn’t acknowledged him at all. He catches a glimpse of her face every now and then, but the only emotion visible on it is concentration. Probably making sure their target hasn’t moved.

It’s only when they’re on the steps of the old metal structure that she turns around, her eye flickering to the swords on his back and then to his face.

“If he is here, you will not try to harm him,” she says, voice flat and cold. “He may find the challenge that sparring with you brings exhilarating, but I don’t. I kill those I fight.”

He meets her eyes with far more confidence than he actually feels. “Take him back into hiding and don’t hurt anyone else, and I’ll leave you be. Just like the last few years.”

She hums her little tune again and nods.

She steps inside, and he follows.

-

The sharp smell of Mako permeates every room in the reactor. The man following her coughs as he breathes it in and mumbles a curse. Jenova pays it no mind.

There is blood in the air too, coppery and bitter. Not the old blood of those that died here back when the town burned, but fresh, living blood, barely separated from the heartbeat that moved it. It tastes terribly like home.

Jenova does not feel fear the way humans do. Fear requires the prerequisite of mortality, a thing she has never known. But she does know time, and how it eats all things familiar, sometimes before you’re ready to let them be eaten.

Which is why, when she steps into the innermost room of the structure, where broken glass and bent metal and crumbling cement litter the floor, where Sephiroth stands in front of the empty specimen tank, motionless in the centre of an invisible yet instantly apparent clockface that moves in all directions at once, when the man, Cloud, sucks in a breath behind her and tenses, she does not hesitate.

She steps forward and reaches out and grabs Sephiroth’s neck and _pulls_.

He stumbles with a noise she files away for identification later as the clockface stutters beneath him, eyes focusing on her for only a moment before they roll back in his head and he collapses onto his hands and knees. His muscles convulse, shudders running through his whole body. And then he opens his mouth and _gags_ , and throws up.

It’s green and red and sharp and coppery, and she holds onto his neck tight while he shakes at her feet. It takes a truly eternal minute until he finally manages to draw in a wheezing, difficult breath and coughs up the last few drops of Mako and blood.

They never even hit the floor. They disappear into the clockface.

Jenova lets go of his neck and runs a soothing hand through his hair, waits patiently while the shudders subside and Sephiroth finds his way back to himself. The clockface is mercifully still around them.

When he finally regains full control of his limbs, he throws his arms around her middle without a word and presses his face against the skin of her hip, breathing in deeply and then exhaling with a shaky, stifled sob. Jenova continues to pet his hair.

At the other end of the room, she sees Cloud take a careful step backwards. He finds her gaze, and she nods. He doesn’t turn around until he’s at the door, then all but flees. She feels his presence fade as he does, back down the mountains and away, back to his friends and the rest of his species. She probably shouldn’t call on him again, she thinks. He does not appreciate it.

A voice pulls her from her musings, rough and strained. “What happened?”

Jenova looks down into Sephiroth’s eyes. He’s staring up at her with something like fear across his face – too exhausted for panic but too upset for joy. She smiles in what she hopes is a reassuring manner.

“Gravity happened,” she tells him matter-of-factly. “Time caught you in its gravity and tried to eat you. But it didn’t. Because you’re mine.”

He frowns, opens his mouth as if to comment on how little sense that makes (and she can’t exactly blame him, not when time still affects him so very clearly), but then instead just sighs and rests his forehead against her skin once more. His breath is warm and fleeting and irregular. Jenova hums her little tune. She knows it makes him smile even without seeing it.

“I was drowning,” he finally murmurs. Jenova cocks her head to the side and falls silent. “I was drowning, just like… just like when we first met. Just like back then. Do you remember that?”

“I do.”

“I never really thought back on it. On how I drowned and _died_. Isn’t that strange?”

“It is.”

Sephiroth looks up at her. He looks deeply confused. “Do you think back to the times _you_ died? Do you remember them?”

Jenova shrugs, and pets his hair some more, relishing how he subconsciously leans into her touch. “I don’t die,” she says. “I exist, or I don’t, and there is very little difference between the two.”

The difference is little, but it matters. It should not, but it does. It does and it is wrapped around her body in a desperate plea for comfort.

Sephiroth smiles up at her. She can see the red and green staining his teeth. “Well, I feel a pretty strong difference, and I happen to prefer existing to whatever the alternative is. Don’t you agree?”

“I do.”

Jenova bends down and kisses the crown of his head, and wraps her arms around him tightly. She will have to be more careful, she thinks. The gravity well that is time is hungry, and would consume him without a second thought.

And if it did, she may just have to consume it in return.

**Author's Note:**

> jenova: hey where’s sephiroth
> 
> me: idk probably body horror


End file.
